Shutdown Items is an application which will allow a system running system 7.0 or later to have a folder which is analogous to the Startup Items folder. Any applications or sounds placed within the "Shutdown Items" folder, which you create inside your System folder, will be launched or played during shutdown. Typically, you place the Shutdown Items application inside your Startup Items folder.
In addition, you can program your mac to automatically shut itself down at a predetermined time, or even shut down a remote macintosh on your network! You may choose to automatically empty your trash during shutdown, as well.
Since this application uses AppleEvents to do its work, system 7.0 or later is required. Since Shutdown Items is a small application, you do not have to add yet another extension to your System folder, and wonder what incompatibility you will discover. You also have control over how much memory is used. Shutdown Items will run in as little as 50K of RAM, and the default of 83K should be more than enough.
Any application or desk accessory you have in the Shutdown Items folder will be launched during shutdown. If a text file is found in the Shutdown Items folder, the first 255 characters will be displayed as sort of a farewell message. You may want to remind novice users of something in this manner. Any sound file which you can play by double-clicking from the system 7 Finder will be played as well, at full speaker volume (these sound files contain a "snd " resource, and are of type "sfil"). By putting a sound file in the Startup Items folder, and the Shutdown Items folder, you can have a welcome and goodbye sound without using any system extensions!
Shutdown Items will play very large sound files now (version 1.1 and earlier required a large memory partition for large sounds), without using alot of its own memory (some memory is "borrowed" from the system temporarily).
Empty Trash on Shut Down
If this option is checked, then the trash will be emptied just before shutting down.
Auto Shut Down
If this option is checked, then the macintosh will automatically shut itself down according to the conditions set in the Auto Shut Down Options dialog box.
Auto Shut Down Options
This is how you set the conditions under which an automatic shut down (or restart) will occur, if that feature is enabled. You may program the mac to shut down after a number of minutes after startup (startup is the time that Shutdown Items is launched, which will coincide with system boot time if Shutdown Items is in the Startup Items folder). Alternatively, you may also set the mac to shut down at a certain time of day.
You may choose to have the mac give a warning before shut down in which the user must respond, or the mac can "silently" shut down. Even in the latter case a warning will be displayed, and the user may cancel the shut down, but the shut down will proceed after a predefined time limit if not canceled.
If desired, you may cause your mac to Restart, instead of Shut Down.
If you choose "Auto Shut Down one time only", then the automatic shutdown will happen only once. Otherwise, "Auto Shutdown" will be enabled the next time Shutdown Items is launched (user preferences are saved when Shutdown Items quits, and will be remembered the next time the application is launched).
Remote Shutdown
You may shut down (or restart) another macintosh on your network with the Remote Shutdown option. This requires that the other macintosh be running a copy of Shutdown Items. When you choose this option, you will see a dialog box which shows other macintoshes on your network, and the AppleEvent-aware programs running on these machines. You must choose a "Shutdown Items" program on some macintosh; choosing something else will not have the desired effect.
After choosing another Shutdown Items application, you may choose to restart or shut down the other macintosh. The appropriate command will be sent (via AppleEvents) to the remote copy of Shutdown Items, and that application will shut down or restart its macintosh.
As an unsupported feature (?), you may choose the Finder of your own macintosh, and you can restart or shut down your own computer this way. This was supposed to work across the network, but this feature currently only works locally (which is not very useful). For now, you must have a copy of Shutdown Items running on the remote macintosh.
In order for this remote shut down to work, the remote macintosh must have "program linking" turned on, and the remote Shutdown Items application itself must have the linking option enabled (if you are confused by these terms, consult your network manager). In addition, you must have the appropriate privileges for such an operation (you may be asked to give a password). Even though this feature sounds dangerous, it really isn't -- everything must be set up properly ahead of time.
Since remote shut down is equivalent to selecting Shut Down or Restart from the Special menu, any applications currently running with unsaved work will stop the shut down process, like you would expect.
Support Shareware!
This is a shareware application. You may distribute it freely (with this document), but if you keep it around, you are honor-bound to register the product with me and send in $10.00. Site licenses are available, and you may order the product directly from me if you want your own original disk (include $2.00 shipping in the US).
I worked very hard to write this program, and you can't get much for $10.00 in a commercial software store, so send in your registration fee and encourage people like me to produce useful software for next to nothing.
Registered users will get some of their wishes implemented in the next version, receive minor intermediate releases as required/desired, and receive printed documentation (on request) which is much better than this readme file. If you find any bugs, rest assured they will be fixed if you tell me and send in your fee.
John Covele
22027 McClellan Rd
Cupertino, CA 95014
America Online: Keymaster5 (preferred online address)
